The Game
by SpaceDreamer
Summary: At first, Zenith had misgivings. The game reminded him a bit too much of that time he had gotten lost in a maze of tunnels without his night vision goggles. Nessa had never coddled him, however, and he was willing to try his skills against hers. But gradually, the game began to change, feeling less like a training exercise and more like...something else.


Ever since he had gotten lost in the dark sewers of Varga the Hutt's palace that time, she had started playing this game with him. Zenith would come back to the ship, weary, sometimes distracted, and find that the lights had all been disabled. The first time, he had been taken off guard, thinking that the ship had been sabotaged, until he saw the note she had left him.

_Zenith. Think of this as a training exercise. I designed it for you. -Nessa_

He had called for her, muttering curses when she didn't answer, trying to find a light that worked. Finally, in frustration and defeat, he had followed the sound of her faint laughter, blundering through the ship with hands outstretched. That first time, he had been irritated with her, maybe even angry. Later, when she had done it again, he had understood, and had respected her for it. She had never been one to coddle him.

He was grateful that she had rescued him that time in the sewers, of course. When his night goggles had failed and he had lost comm contact with the rest of the crew, he hadn't panicked right away. He was used to dangerous infiltration missions. But the underbelly of Varga's palace was a maze, where tunnels unexpectedly dropped out into deep pits of swirling sludge, where womp rats scurried between his legs and nipped at his calves. Once, he had slipped and plummeted into a current of icy cold, foul water, and for a time he had tumbled through the blackness, waiting for the ground to inevitably fall away from beneath him, expecting the worst. It was shortly after that when he had had to admit that he was well and truly lost.

Nessa had found him, and had led him out of the blackness. Her Force sight was unerring, honed from infancy like all of her race, the only kind of sight she knew.

Two weeks later, she had started with the game, under the guise that he needed to learn the few basics of navigation without sight. But he was a Twi'lek, not a Miraluka. It was a stupid exercise.

"How else are you going to learn, Zenith?" Nessa had said. It was only later that he discovered that the game was not really about navigation at all.

At some point, Zenith had stopped being annoyed with her and had begun to enjoy the challenge, maybe just a little. He had learned a few of her tricks already. Relying on memory was not enough. She would move the furniture, even going so far as to upend some pieces or take them to completely different rooms. The first time, she had stayed put, but since then she had taken to moving throughout the ship, increasing the difficulty of the task. Something about the sound of her voice calling to him from the dark gave him a strange thrill. He began anticipating her touch, waiting for it to startle him, sometimes feathery light, sometimes stronger and more abrupt.

He had a few tricks of his own, however.

Today, he had brought his night vision goggles with him. In fact, he had been carrying them on him surreptitiously for the last four days, all in anticipation of the next time the game arose.

He put them on now, flicked the switch, and watched as his world shone in tones of blue. Was Miraluka sight at all like this? Edges and corners became pronounced streaks of light, solid objects were voids of darkness, his hand became a gray shadow. He moved confidently through the ship, searching. This time, he would find her.

"Zenith." Her voice was intimately close, and he fancied that he could feel the eddy of air that stirred at her passing. "Now, now. That is cheating."

Somehow, she had crept up on him from behind.

"Damn it, Jedi. The advantage is yours already." His hand reached for the goggles, reluctantly so, and then he felt a gentle tug as she pulled them from his fingers.

"Doesn't matter," he told her. "Know where you are now."

He turned and lunged for her, arm outstretched, already anticipating the soft folds of her robe against his palm, but no, his hand grasped at empty air.

She let out a breathy laugh, silent except for the intake of breath at the end. He stilled, remembering past lessons she had taught him. She hadn't gone far.

The game had started with him simply being tasked to locate her. At some point, however this had changed. Now, his goal was to catch her.

There. Her footsteps on the metal floor. They were receding. He followed.

Zenith suspected that the game had started out as a genuine test. As a way for him to refine his skills, gain some confidence, maybe even (dare he admit it) conquer some of the fear that had gripped him that time in the sewers. When Zenith had first joined Nessa's crew, he had made her promise that she would tell him if he ever became lazy or lax in his diligence. That she would talk to him straight about his faults. That was the only way he could improve.

He hadn't quite expected her to probe so deeply into his head. She questioned his motives, encouraged him to test her authority. Sometimes she disagreed with him, but more often than not, she surprised him. She was a Jedi that knew how to get things done and she wasn't afraid to push against the constraints that usually bound members of her order. She doled out justice like a hawk sinking talons into its prey - swift, certain, final. She was fair and not unkind, but to her enemies she showed no mercy.

"Who do you want dead?" he had asked her once. He would have obeyed her word without question, with eagerness even. She hated the Empire and the Sith as much as he did.

"We do only what we must, Zenith," she had said. "But take no joy from it. Then you become no better than they."

Did he enjoy killing? No. But he enjoyed killing for her, it meant bringing down the Empire. If it meant seeing dignity restored to the downtrodden, or the watching the guilty be punished. If it meant pleasing her. He became her right-hand man. He was the bullet in the dark, her knight of justice, her executioner. He wanted to be fearless for her.

Then came the incident at the sewers. By the time Nessa found him, his nerves were frayed, his courage almost broken. How long had he wandered in those sightless tunnels? One hour? Two? Every sound heralded the approach of a predator or a potential attacker. He was blind, but he imagined his foes watching him in the dark, laughing, secretly relishing his weakness. After the current had swept him away, he had clawed at the walls for purchase, flailing for any hand hold or crevice. Finally he had gotten tangled in something stringy and coated with slime. His imagination had gotten the better of him, and he had pictured himself being strangled in the entrails of a rotting carcass. He had yelled in horror, choking on the dirty water, prying his limbs loose. Something solid and sharp had gashed him across the torso and he had latched onto it - a nearby ledge.

Had Nessa heard him cry out? He had been preoccupied with this for days, humiliated and ashamed, until he realized something even more obvious. She had known his fear, regardless. No emotion was hidden from her. His heart was pounding so forcefully that he thought surely every denizen of the tunnels could hear it. When she found him, he had clung to her, unable to control his trembling arms, unwilling to let go. Her hands had soothed him in the darkness, her voice confident and gentle.

"I have you now," she said. "I won't let you go."

He had almost sobbed with relief at those words, had almost had his manhood completely undone before her.

Once they were safely away, she had admonished him for trying to find his own way out, for not staying put as soon as their communications had dropped. He had been too dazed to respond. But he remembered well the way she stopped in her tracks and touched her hand to his cheek.

"I will always come for you, Zenith. No matter what."

He had nodded, dumbly, still feeling the tingle of her fingertips after they were gone.

Now, a new sound came to his ears, the whisper of fabric catching against itself, the faintest creak of the floor. Zenith crept in the direction where he knew Nessa had traveled. This was the hallway he knew, and that gap in the wall led into the galley...the rungs that slapped against his hand led upwards to the defensive turrets...and here, stairs opened up in the floor. Zenith crept down carefully, noticing a trace of sweetness in the air, the mist of her perfume left behind in the wake of her passing. Through a doorway ahead lay the storage room. Zenith stopped. The air felt lofty here, carrying sounds away and thinning them. But the room was not empty. Zenith slid a foot along the floor. Once, Nessa had placed some crates here and he had nearly toppled over them. He reached behind him for his rifle and tapped it lightly against the floor like a cane, then swept it side to side. There, a box lying askew. He moved around it, his hand traveling over the surface, trying to determine height.

He touched cloth. There was an intake of breath and the cloth pulled away from his hands, but not before he had grasped a handful of it. For a moment he was confused. The feel of her Jedi robes was familiar to him, but this was silkier, the surface broken up by patterns of stitching. She had been hiding behind the crate and he was almost upon her. He slipped around to the far side, and felt the air. Nothing. He swung the rifle low and bumped something.

There was a rustle as she skittered away. He ducked low, sweeping his hand across the floor, but found nothing.

"So close," he muttered.

He heard her running away, making no effort to conceal her footsteps this time. She was leaving the storage area and heading back up the stairs.

He followed, moving quicker now. Mouthing the words, he counted, four, five, six steps and then predictably, his rifle hit the bottom stair. He bounded up it, and heard her make a tiny squeal. He had almost caught up with her.

He stopped, testing the silence. Which way had she gone now?

"This way, Zenith," she said, her voice sounding mirthful and a just a bit breathless. Did the thought of him catching her excite her as it did him? He judged her distance to be no more than two meters away. He moved towards her voice, and then crept closer still as he heard the tapping of her feet backing away.

He stopped. She had backed into a doorway, but Zenith knew exactly where she was. She stood at the threshold of her bedroom door. Zenith had never set foot inside that room, and had only once even glimpsed the inside. He didn't think she had even bothered installing lights in there. Once he had seen her meditating on a rug just inside the door, a glowing holocron cupped in her hands. It had cast a golden glow across her dusky skin, had caught in the beads that decorated her eye mask. Had she forgotten to close the door? He had scurried away, not wanting to pry.

"What are you thinking, Zenith?" Nessa asked. Her voice was like silk, shivering down his lekku. Could she read his thoughts too?

"You're...uh…" For kriffin' sakes, now was not the time to act flustered. "That's your bedroom. The game over?" His own voice sounded flat to his ears. Mundane. He wondered if he had broken the spell. Or if he was the only one who felt just a bit dizzy right now.

"It can't be over. You haven't caught me yet."

He mind raced. He _had_ caught her already, sort of. But she had pulled away and kept the game in play. What was she expecting? He curled his fingers against his palm, recalling the feel of that unfamiliar cloth. What _was_ she wearing?

"You are a churn of emotions and of indecision. Is this a hard test to fulfil?"

He was about to respond, his mouth open, but for a moment the words stuck. Then finally, they came out, pulled roughly from his throat. "I accept any challenge."

She laughed, and he felt something tugging at him. For a moment, he was startled. How had she closed the distance between them so fast? But no, he realized, it was no earthly hands which touched him now. The tugging grew stronger, and Zenith was forced to catch his balance by shuffling forward. He threw out his hands, suddenly afraid that he would knock into her.

Instead, he lurched through her doorway and a good ways into the room, before the tugging ceased and he was ruler of his own momentum again. He heard the door quietly swish shut. For a moment he swayed on his feet, his mind catching on a bit too late that he had stopped moving.

"You don't like that much, do you?" She sounded apologetic.

He shrugged. "Feels weird."

"I forget sometimes that being around Force manipulation is still new to you."

"Does make me wonder what else you can do." He'd seen her wave her hand and cast grown warriors into the air, had watched the earth tear open under her feet, giving up rocks and debris that she hurled at enemies. But that was on the battlefield. He had not given much thought to what she might be capable of in...other situations.

"That time in the sewers," Nessa said. "You didn't believe I would come for you, did you?"

"Not your job. Wasn't the mission."

"But I did. And I always will. I told you that when your job was done, that I would make sure you got out safely. I just want you to believe in me."

"Jedi! Nessa-"

"We are partners."

He swallowed. "We are."

Zenith's breath felt too shallow. Where was she now? Was she as close as he thought she was?

"You still haven't caught me yet."

"True." He waited a beat and then lunged forward, sweeping a hand around him in an arc. He heard a quick shuffle, her movement no doubt taking her out of reach. He continued to step forward, moving carefully, afraid of he would never find her. Afraid that he would. What if his hands touched some part of her where they shouldn't?

Then, his fingers caught on something. He stumbled forward, reaching, and his hand closed around an arm. No, definitely not robes. His fingers wrapped around her bare skin, warm and real beneath his hand. He pulled her towards him, reaching out with a second hand. She was facing away from him, perhaps in the midst of trying to scamper away again. His second hand found her waist and he curled an arm around her, pressing her against him. Her hair feathered against his nose and chin, and he could feel the rise and fall of her breathing against her abdomen.

That silky material again. She was swathed in it. There was a lacy pattern that trailed upwards from her stomach, fanning out as it crept higher, tracing the curves of her body.

"This is nice," he said into her ear.

"The dress, you mean? Or the game?"

"Both." Definitely both.

His lips found the soft arch of her neck and she tilted her head, a sigh escaping her. Oh, kriffin' hell. He body was already five steps ahead of him and too eager by half. She allowed his hand to keep exploring, her own fingertips coming to rest against the arm that held her. Then she was turning in his grasp, her hands coming up to frame his face, her nose brushing against his. Her lips found him, sweet and eager and bold.

He didn't want her to pull away, didn't want to be separated from her. But she stepped back, tugging loose from his grip. One of her hands clasped his and she began to lead him forward.

"Where?-"

There was a flash of light and Zenith shied away, shading his eyes. Nessa was holding a glowing light in her palm. Perhaps she had heard his intake of breath, or maybe she was aware that abrupt changes in light are painful, because she dimmed it to a gentle halo. Then she held out her hand and her room was revealed.

The room was a rainbow of color. So many shades together should have looked gaudy and scattered, but somehow Zenith was reminded instead of the jungles of Belsavis, where brilliant reds and yellows contrasted with the greenery of the plant life, the browns of the soil, the pale blue of the sky.

"It's a big clashing mess, right? I always wonder how others see it."

"No," he said quickly. "It's...cheerful. Pleasant."

There was a large, comfortable-looking bed just before them, with the sheets turned down and one long pillow laid across the head. Zenith glanced at Nessa. Her dress was a pale blue, with cut-outs along the arms and a ruffled skirt. He'd never seen her wear anything like that.

"Zenith?" Her face turned towards his. "Will you stay tonight?"

A tightening began deep in his belly, then radiated outward, flooding his limbs with heat. "Gladly." And the night after that if she would have him.

She sighed, smiling, as if she had doubted his answer. "Good." The light winked out.

Zenith slid the rifle off his back, dropped it gently to the floor, and pushed it away with his foot. Nessa was already tugging on the collar of his shirt, her hands searching for whatever fastened it. He let her peel it off of him, turning slowly as she pulled his arms loose. But before he could turn back around, her hands were on his shoulders, trailing across his scalp, caressing and whisper-light. He held his breath, an involuntary reflex that came over him with the feel of her fingers upon his lekku. She stroked each one gently from head to tip, leaving no spot untouched. A shudder passed through him, and one of his lekku twitched against his back, accompanied by a delicious tingle that delved under his scalp like a cold shiver.

"Oh," Nessa said. Her hands had dropped away. "Is everything ok?"

Oh stars yes.

"F-fine," he answered, finding his voice and wondering if she could hear the tremble in it. "Just...sensitive."

"You have so many scars," she said quietly.

"Shrapnel, mostly. From a bomb outside Sobrik last year."

"Hmm." Her hands were making a thorough exploration, searching out every last scar, presumably.

"Missed one."

"I did? Where?"

He took her hand in the dark and led it to the ripple of tender skin just above his hip. Her fingers trailed along the scar until it disappeared beneath the waistband of his pants.

"It keeps going," she said. She slid a fingertip as far as she could and then stopped.

"It does."

"Just how far?"

He heard himself chuckle. If this was a new game, he liked it as well. He removed his belt and slid his pants off his hips. Her touch followed the contours of the scar until it ended at the top of his thigh.

Zenith realized that he was almost entirely unclothed, but Nessa wasn't. "Your turn." he slid his hands around her shoulders and down her back, wondering how this dress came off. She gave a little laugh and reached behind her head, and Zenith felt the fabric of her dress falling away.

It was a strange feeling, being essentially blind, particularly when he knew that Nessa was under no such handicap. He wondered how he appeared to her. To him she became a series of sensations. The softness of her skin against his hands, his chest, his lips. The gentle swells and dips of her body. Her heat underneath his fingers. Her sighs and whispers. The feel of her heartbeat flush against his own.

"Did I win the game?" he whispered to her at last.

She was draped over his chest, her head resting just under his chin. He still couldn't keep his hands off of her, fascinated now with the silky tousle that was her hair.

"This round, only," she replied. "I think we need to make this a habitual exercise, don't you?"

"A regular regimen." He had never looked forward to training so much.


End file.
